The Closet

Korean horror movies have been here for a while and if you are aware of that, you probably know they've put out some really good movies. While I would not put this at the top of any list, I still think it is a really good one. Visually speaking but also from a story standpoint. Characters are flawed as they should be and make decisions that are wrong .. in a way.

Again sometimes it is very hard to know what to do - not to mention certain things are ok to happen or should happen so the story is more interesting. And theer is more to this than just the space of the closet ... there's something behind it (no pun intended). This can be a good/frightening time, if you dig it

Non-creatively borrowed (to say politely) theme elements done many times before. 1. Family with tragic history go to live in an isolated house with a past. 2. Usual vengeful spirit inhabiting some hidden space (this case a done before closet). 3. A child is the object of the spirit's attention who also happens to be a child. A stuffed toy as prop, of course. 4. Brief appearances by said spirit-child to possess the human child & bring her into the spirit world. 5. A bit of newspaper digging brings up past child disappearances. 6. A spirt hunter cartoonishly shows up & brings the usual electrical magnetic field detectors to locate spirits, but as any high school student will tell you they're only good at telling you that electricity is in the house - duh! 7. Usual circle of candles w/drumming, chants, and ancient textbook showing pictures of nasty spirits.

Metaphysical horror film from South Korea. An obvious influence from other films of the genre, could be a modern Poltergeist or Insidious, with the excellent Korean cinema giving its own identity to the genre. It all started decades ago with a dramatic and painful death of a girl. Something that, however, remained to be haunted over the years. Many children disappeared from time to time under unknown circumstances. Now, a widowed father and his daughter are moving to a remote house close to nature so that the girl can feel a little bit better after the loss of her mother. However, there is something strange in the little girl's room and specifically in the closet. Something that will make the little one change gradually until she mysteriously disappears. How far can her father go to bring her back? An excellent effort from Korea, with good acting, very good direction and effects and a good balance of action / suspense and plot but also a balance of horror / drama and humor, although I would personally remove every element of humor to make it even darker. Very good recommendation overall from Korea and definitely recommended for fans of the genre.

I would say this is a so-so average korean horror film, I have watched better ones before. But I am definitely IMPRESSED by the child actress Kim Shi-A who portrayed the role of Myung-Jin. Just as I was about to rate this movie a 6/10, I realised it wouldn't do her justice after watching her performance during the 2nd half of the movie. Of course Ha Jung-Woo is already an established actor, but seeing a kid (Kim Shi-A) giving such impressive performance, it's really kudos mann...

Kwang-bin Kim's full length directorial debut, Keullojet (the Closet) 2020, is clearly influenced not only by the Ringu series of films but also well-established themes in Asian horror (eg a vindictive female ghost). However there is a lot more to Keullojet. The atmosphere created beautifully compliments the themes which the film conveys and the acting, esp by Jung-wu Ha and Nam-gil Kim, is excellent. As such Keullojet becomes more than something like the tacky Insidious (yet another movie which clearly influenced the second act) and presents a well-scripted secondary layer to it. 7/10.